From the nexus of nb;nb;, two flares of fire burst forth, annihilating the four administrative planets of the Farsom Starfield. Within the fire-well, it was as if billions of undead spirits danced, and the psychic shockwave from countless beings dying in agony caused every pore on the bodies of Gu Chen, Han Kui, and their group to stand on end.

The monstrous resentment even condensed into a visible mass of black miasma, swirling in the void. The piercing screeches caused Gu Chen, even from his distant hiding spot, to feel pain in his eardrums.

Ducat sat cross-legged on a metallic disc, silently chanting sutras of salvation. His eyes were lowered, watching the disintegrating planet with an expressionless face.

Gu Chen patted Ducat’s shoulder and whispered, “Chanting salvation sutras is useless; they cannot be reincarnated now.”

With a sweep of his hand, six great banners, pitch-black and exuding dense demonic energy, shot out, instantly swallowing the souls, spirits, and the dying wrath of countless beings. Having devoured so many souls, spirits, and negative energies, the luster of the Six Desires Heavenly Demon Banners grew even deeper. The black light almost seemed to flow down the fabric of the banners. The banner material, crafted from human skin and tendons, had been fused into a single substance by the concentrated negative energy, transforming into a material as glossy and nearly transparent as crystal.

A demon god, with six indistinct faces hidden within the swirling black smoke, vaguely manifested on the banner surface, appearing to dance with delight as if ready to burst forth from within. Once these demon gods absorbed a little more negative energy, they would likely coalesce their true forms. Once unleashed, they could stir the negative emotions hidden deep within the souls of cultivators, igniting a wisp of innate Yin Fire to destroy the root foundation and primordial spirit of a practitioner. Nothing could be more venomous.

Han Kui watched the Heavenly Demon Banners dancing in the air and asked with astonishment, “Boy, you’ve killed so many people, and you’ve even taken their souls to refine artifacts. Aren’t you afraid of the Heavenly Tribulation?”

Gu Chen looked coldly at Han Kui and asked straightforwardly, “What is the Heavenly Tribulation?”

Han Kui tilted his head back and sneered, “The decree that upholds the Heavenly Dao. Anyone who violates it shall be reduced to dust.”

Closing his hand to recall the Six-Faced Heavenly Demon Banners, Gu Chen shook his head. “That is the decree of the Heavenly Dao, which is different from my own Dao. I have my own Dao; it has nothing to do with the Heavenly Dao.”

Gazing coldly at the planet that had already shattered into billions of fragments, Gu Chen said slowly, “They slaughtered six billion of my kin. I must repay them a thousand times a billion times over. My Dao is the Dao of Slaughter. It was set the moment Earth was destroyed; I had no choice but to do this.”

Peng Hua, who had been silently wrapping himself with his wings on the side, suddenly straightened up. Blood-light flowed across his flesh wings, and his black hair shot up toward the sky. A colossal, immense power erupted from his body in all directions, causing chaos in the surrounding forces of heaven and earth. Peng Hua threw his head back and cheered, “To hell with any Dao! If it can rapidly increase my cultivation, it’s a good Dao! Void Realm, here I come!”

After slaughtering dozens of planets and extracting the vital essence of countless people to store within his body, constantly boosting his cultivation, coupled with the vital energy plundered from cultivators just moments before, Peng Hua was finally stimulated to break through the threshold of the Void Realm within a few short months, officially ascending to Void Realm cultivation. Fierce, sinister corpse qi churned out from Peng Hua’s body, weaving a thick, dark cloud above his head. Although situated in the near-vacuum of space, a chilling, soughing wind suddenly swept around him.

Peng Hua ignored everyone, raising his arms to the sky and shouting loudly, “What damn Heavenly Dao? Where were you all when my sect was destroyed? An eye for an eye, blood for blood, conquering the world, embracing all beauties—this is my Dao! This is the Dao I have chosen! Get lost, you damn Heavenly Dao, Great Dao!”

Glancing sideways at Peng Hua, Gu Chen shoved the Six-Faced Heavenly Demon Banners into his hand, then turned and fled. A string of afterimages wrapped around Gu Chen’s body, carrying him tens of thousands of miles away in an instant.

Ducat and Han Kui also fled faster than anyone. The amount of blood they had on their hands during this period was immense. If they couldn't withstand the Heavenly Thunder, it would strike them down too.

Peng Hua spat a blast of Yin Wind and evil energy towards the three fleeing figures, muttering, “No loyalty.”

In the void, a fiercely churning mass of purplish-red cloud suddenly materialized. This cloud was over a hundred times larger than the tribulation clouds present when the Corpse Emperor and others underwent tribulation on the moon. Electric lights, vast as flood dragons, surged within the tribulation cloud. Though no sound was emitted, everyone heard the thunderous roar of the lightning in their souls.

Peng Hua froze, holding the Heavenly Demon Banner, staring blankly at the tribulation cloud above. He suddenly burst into curses, “Stinking old heavens, I only killed a few people! Do you have to summon such a grandiose tribulation cloud? That’s unfair!” Along with his roar, Peng Hua frantically pulled nearly a hundred Immortal Artifacts from his storage ring with all eight limbs. He laughed arrogantly, “But your uncle came prepared! I’m not afraid of you at all! If you have the guts, strike all the Immortal Artifacts Grand Master Dazhuo left me into smithereens!”

After rummaging through the pile of Immortal Artifacts, Peng Hua fiercely hurled a thirty-three-jointed bamboo whip, gleaming with cyan light, toward the tribulation cloud.

It seemed Peng Hua’s provocation enraged the tribulation cloud. Three continuous bolts of purple lightning, as thick as water vats, descended from the sky, striking the bamboo whip with brutal force. The whip floated arrogantly in the void, absorbing the energy contained in the three lightning bolts completely, causing the cyan light wrapped around the whip to shine even more intensely.

The tribulation cloud churned violently, the surrounding miasma gradually contracting towards the center. After about fifteen minutes, the cloud, which had once covered an area of over ten miles, compressed into a nearly solid, purplish-red crystal the size of a human head. Innumerable purple lightning strands, as fine as a strand of hair, silently circled and danced around this crystal. As the lightning rubbed against itself, a lotus-shaped flame, as large as a millstone and crimson like blood, gradually formed above Peng Hua.

“Red Lotus Karmic Fire!” Gu Chen and Han Kui exclaimed simultaneously.

Han Kui glanced at Gu Chen with surprise. “Good insight. I thought cultivators of this era didn’t know what the Red Lotus Karmic Fire was! Look, this is the retribution for you killing so many people. For cultivators, there is no concept of afterlife retribution; all karma, all entanglement, is repaid in this life.”

Gu Chen sneered, suddenly leaping towards Peng Hua. He laughed loudly, “Repaid in this life? Then I will test what this retribution is all about. Han Kui, you’ve killed no less than us—aren’t you worried about whether you can survive these Heavenly Tribulations?”

Han Kui lightly stroked her hair and shook her head indifferently. Her soul essence was that of an Innate Star Monarch. Innate beings knew nothing of Heavenly Tribulations. All Heavenly Tribulations were established by the Heavenly Court after the three realms formed, under the rules set by the Heavenly Dao, but these rules could not bind Innate beings. With no Primordial Chains binding her, the Heavenly Tribulation would never descend; what did she have to fear?

Three continuous bolts of purple lightning carrying the Red Lotus Karmic Fire struck down from the sky. Accompanied by a piercing roar, the thirty-three-jointed bamboo whip was smashed into powder. The power of this lightning tribulation was now more than a hundred times stronger than before! The whip’s demise was so swift that even Peng Hua was startled. Before he could throw out another Immortal Artifact, three more bolts of lightning crashed down upon him.

Gu Chen had just flashed to Peng Hua’s side. He looked up sharply; the center of the scarlet-red eye in his left socket held a tiny point of deep, condensed light that was slowly rotating. All three bolts of Heavenly Thunder blasted straight into the depths hidden within his left eye and were completely devoured by the Sun Blazing Flame concealed there. It was as if a bucket of gasoline had been poured onto a spark; the black light in Gu Chen’s right eye flared brilliantly, and the Sun Blazing Flame within his body surged rapidly, reaching one-hundredth the quantity of the Grand Yin Dark Flame within a few breaths.

Shouting “Good!” Gu Chen’s left eye shot out a stream of intensely hot black flame, swallowing the purplish-red crystal formed by the tribulation cloud and the Red Lotus Karmic Fire. The black light in his left eye soared, gradually covering his scarlet-red iris until his entire eyeball was dyed black. This blackness was so dense that it took a full quarter-hour to slowly dissipate, revealing his pure, blood-colored eyeball once more. Immediately after, a black fire ignited on his brow, slowly burning over his entire body; even his hair strands were wrapped in a thread of extremely fine black flame, slowly restructuring his physical form.

His body and hair tempered and scorched by the complex refining of the Grand Yin Dark Flame and the Sun Blazing Flame, Gu Chen’s Innate Body became increasingly resilient. However, what unsettled him was that a wisp of Sun Blazing Flame had permeated into his four Natal Artifacts: the Grand Yin Robe, the Grand Yin Thorn, the Five Waters Dragon Whisker Fan, and the Azure Lotus Ring were all tainted with a trace of the Sun Blazing Flame’s aura.

Anxiously probing his Natal Artifacts with his divine sense, they didn't seem to be transforming negatively; instead, the texture of the Grand Yin Robe had become denser and tougher.

Lacking a cultivation method to refine the energy of the Sun, Gu Chen could not judge whether this situation was good or bad. He could only leave it to fate and allow the wisp of Sun Blazing Flame to act as it wished. But since the energies of Yin and Sun could coexist harmoniously within him, he supposed it wouldn’t cause him any harm.

After devouring that piece of tribulation cloud and the Red Lotus Karmic Fire, Gu Chen was astonished to find that the Sun Blazing Flame within him had soared to about one-tenth the quantity of the Grand Yin Dark Flame. This small piece of tribulation cloud essence was equivalent to one-tenth of the power Gu Chen had cultivated diligently for several years. Pondering with his head down for a moment, Gu Chen suddenly smiled towards Ducat in the distance. He now had an idea: he must quickly help Ducat cultivate to the Void Realm, and he must have Ducat kill as many people as possible. From now on, all citizens of the Polaris Empire on every planet would be left to Ducat. That way, when he next advanced to the Void Realm and faced a minor tribulation, it would be a perfect opportunity for Gu Chen’s Sun Blazing Flame to feast.

After laughing heartily a few times, Gu Chen linked arms with Peng Hua, and they flew swiftly away, the group speeding towards their next target planet.

Near the Starlight Domain of the Polaris Empire’s Imperial Capital Starfield, there was a stretch of cosmos bestowed upon the Dortro family. This territory contained twenty-four administrative planets and housed thirty-five billion residents. The Dortro family prized natural landscapes above all else; successive generations of the family emphasized harmonious unity with the natural world. Consequently, these twenty-four planets were the most picturesque and possessed the finest natural environments in the entire Polaris Empire.

And one planet, named Yuxu Star, was a focal point of protection for the Dortro family. On this planet, everything retained its original geological features. Apart from a few hundred slave laborers operating heavy machinery to maintain the forests and extinguish wildfires, only members of the Dortro family and their servants resided here.

Jin currently lived in an exquisitely designed small courtyard.

Before her lay an immense blue lake, named Yaochi (Jade Pond). Behind her rose a mountain more than twenty thousand meters high, its peak capped with dazzling white snow. Below the snowline were exotic flowers, rare herbs, and towering, ancient trees, collectively called Yuxu Peak. The courtyard was only about twenty meters square, featuring three main houses and several side rooms. All structures were built from raw wood planks, topped with thick layers of green thatch. Due to their age, the wooden planks near the ground were rotting, giving rise to clusters of white mushrooms and verdant lingzhi mushrooms.

The courtyard was surrounded by dense, primordial forest, teeming with spiritual beasts of astonishing nature. A troop of golden-haired apes lived a few miles away, bringing her various fresh fruits and flowers every morning; in the jungle to the right was a nest of white pythons, with the male, nearly a Jiaolong at a hundred meters long, daily bringing her exotic flowers, rare herbs, and various jewels for her to play with at noon; a group of black-furred fierce tigers lived a dozen miles behind the house, occasionally driving small, agile beasts here to keep Jin company.

Although these exotic beasts treated Jin exceedingly well, they absolutely forbade her from stepping a single foot outside the courtyard. Every time she tried to sneak away, she was either thrown back by the monkeys, scared back by the great white python, or forcefully returned by a blast of foul breath from a massive black tiger.

Inside the courtyard were four maids, bright-eyed, white-toothed, charming, and witty, proficient in all manner of poetry, songs, and even the popular operas and novels of the Star Alliance. They served Jin meticulously every day, terrified of causing her any displeasure. However, being confined to the courtyard was Jin's greatest unhappiness. She screamed, yelled, and harshly berated these four unlucky maids daily, yet the maids always greeted her with ingratiating smiles, acting like four robots who had lost every emotion except laughter.

“Let me leave this damned place!”

On this day, Jin, after flipping a few pages of a script—an emotional opera originating from the Himchi Empire, a six-star civilization in the Star Alliance, touted as the most popular in the Alliance now—could no longer control the burning rage in her heart. Once again, she smashed everything in the room to pieces and tore every scroll she could see into shreds, throwing them wildly about.

The four smiling maids rushed in instantly. They surrounded Jin, using the most humble and gentle tones to urge her to calm down, warning her not to let anger harm her body.

Jin grew angrier, pinching and twisting the faces and arms of the four maids in a frenzy. Her strength was great, and the maids were just ordinary women with no martial arts skill, so soon their bodies were covered in bruises, turning purple and blue. Yet, the four maids continued to surround Jin with warm smiles, ceaselessly persuading her in soft voices.

The more the maids smiled ingratiatingly, the fiercer Jin’s anger burned. After a tense standoff lasting a few minutes, Jin suddenly shrieked and charged out of the house without hesitation. The maids hastily followed by her side, extending delicate hands as if to grab her. But Jin possessed the strength of a low-level ability user; how could a few maids stop her?

Just as Jin was about to burst through the courtyard entrance, the gate woven from reeds suddenly opened. A middle-aged man in a black uniform, wearing a badge of a broken iron hook on his left chest, strode in.

This man was identical to Mu Daoist, only his skin was slightly darker, and his hair was cut short, plastered close to his scalp, unlike Mu Daoist’s long hair.

The middle-aged man spread his arms, blocking Jin. He commanded in a low voice, “Jin, what are you doing?”

Jin stared blankly at the middle-aged man and suddenly roared at the top of her lungs, “Who are you? Let me out!”

The middle-aged man smiled. “I am your—”

Jin looked at the middle-aged man mockingly and sneered, “Oh? You are my father? Then who was the person who snatched me from Earth and brought me here?”

She roared in fury, “My father, the leader of the Broken Hook Ability User Group, was only a six-star ability user! But the person on Earth, who was that?”

The middle-aged man reached out as if to stroke Jin’s head, but Jin slapped his hand away. Shaking his head helplessly, the middle-aged man said in a deep voice, “I am your father, but I am a clone. Does that matter? Both the clone and the main body are controlled by one soul, so what is the difference?”

He pointed to his chest and smiled. “My main body is very powerful, but my clone can only possess six-star ability at most. To protect you, I kept you within the Broken Hook Ability User Group, letting one of my clones—essentially myself—protect you!”

Jin stared blankly at the middle-aged man and screamed in rage, “So all these years, a puppet has been impersonating my father!”

His body trembled slightly, and the middle-aged man sternly admonished Jin, “I am your father.”

“Puppet!” Jin continued to shriek relentlessly, beating hard against the middle-aged man’s body, trying to break through the courtyard gate.

The middle-aged man shielded his front with his hands, barely fending off the furious, storm-like sharp claws and teeth. He shook his head with a bitter smile, but resolutely refused to let Jin rush out of the courtyard.

Suddenly, one of the four maids stiffened. In the blink of an eye, her lips were covered in a layer of red—a strange crimson, yet far more vivid than blood. In a corner of the courtyard, a flower tree about two meters tall, blooming with flowers shaped like poppies but bloodthirsty like them—the kind seen in the Polaris Empire’s Imperial Palace—had sprouted up out of nowhere. Dozens of extremely fine tendrils emerged from the hundreds of fist-sized blossoms on that tree, piercing deeply into several vital points on the back of the maid’s neck.

This maid slowly lifted her head. Blood-light flared intensely in her eyes, and the energy aura released by her body soared from that of an ordinary woman to the peak of the Nascent Soul stage in an instant. The next moment, the flower tree withered suddenly, as if all its essence had been injected into the maid’s body, and the power possessed by the maid instantly skyrocketed to the Divine Transformation stage.

“You are just a puppet; what is there to explain?” With a light wave of her right palm, a ball of blood-colored lightning flickered, effortlessly blasting the upper half of the middle-aged man’s body into dust.

A furious shout echoed from the shredded flesh of the middle-aged man. A thumb-sized, smooth, jade-green orb of light flew out from the scattering blood and flesh, trailing a streak of green light as it rapidly fled toward the sky. But the maid was faster; she opened her mouth and spat out a beam of blood-light that struck the orb, instantly shattering it into countless strands of light rain drifting away.

“Jie jie,” the maid cackled sinisterly, blood-light surging in her eyes, then turned her body. Her sharp claws tore the necks of her three companions to shreds. The stench of blood in the small courtyard grew even thicker.

Jin stumbled backward in fright, staring at the maid and screaming sharply, “Who are you?”

The maid charmingly stroked her long hair and said in a high-pitched, soft voice tinged with an eerie aura, “Jin? Jin! Don’t be afraid, Jin. I gave you that name. My favorite flower is the Blood Jin Flower; what a miraculous flower it is! Your name is the name of the Blood Jin Flower!”

“You, you are—” Jin retreated near the courtyard fence, watching the maid with terror, a vague, terrible premonition stirring in her heart.

The maid advanced a few steps with seductive grace, chuckling. “Don’t be afraid, don’t dodge… Let me see those eyes of yours! Ah ha, the bloodline of the Divine Eye, secretly passed down in the Dortro family—legend says it can see the destiny trajectory of everyone on the River of Fate! Let me see, do you really possess such a pair of eyes?”

Purple light flowed within Jin’s eyes, and a faint trace of fine gold light could be seen circling around the irises. She stared fixedly at the maid and sneered, “I don’t.”

“No, you do,” the maid coldly sneered. “You must have those disaster-star eyes! Otherwise, why would Mu Sha be so cruel to me?”

Closing the distance to Jin in a few steps, the maid gently stroked Jin’s cheek and sighed with emotion. “We gave you life, so we have the right to take your life. But Mu Sha—why did he protect you? Why? Does he truly feel fatherly affection for you? No, he only sees you as a tool.”

Her hands gently cupped Jin’s neck, the maid stared intently into Jin’s eyes and laughed wildly. “He only sees you as a tool. Do you know that? He wants to use you to control me, to use you to strengthen the Dortro family’s power, to use you to achieve his goal of laying claim to the Polaris Empire’s throne!”

“Who are you?” Hot tears streamed from Jin’s eyes. She wailed at the top of her lungs. Her miserable cry was like that of a phoenix bleeding to death; she even damaged her own throat from shouting too loudly and too shrilly, spitting out a few specks of blood that splattered onto the maid’s face.

The maid’s tongue bizarrely elongated to over a foot, slowly licking up the specks of Jin’s blood that had been spat out into her mouth.

She smiled with satisfaction, "Such sweet blood. It's no wonder, considering the child born from his union with me! Darling, don't you understand yet? I am your mother, your mama—the woman who carried you for twelve grueling months, the woman!"

It felt as if lightning had struck the top of Jin's head. A blankness washed over her eyes as she stared, utterly bewildered, at this strange, ethereal attendant.

"No, you cannot be my mother! My mother died long ago. She was gentle, kind. Before I slept as a child, she would sing lullabies to soothe me to sleep, because the Broken Hook Adept Group was ambushed by cosmic pirates, and Mother died protecting me. You are not her. You are not my mother." Jin muttered this to herself in a daze, repeating the memory of her true mother.

"Oh, heavens! That damned Musha." The attendant cursed scornfully, "I am alive, and I am the Empress of the Polar Star Empire! That unfortunate woman who sang you to sleep was merely a wet nurse Musha hired. When you were almost old enough to remember things, he got rid of her to save trouble. It's as simple as that."

The attendant looked mockingly at the petrified Jin and chuckled with delight. "A gentle, kind mother? I'm afraid such a person never existed. Do you know what the ministers of the Polar Star Empire called me?"

Smugly extending her long tongue to lick a trace of blood clinging to the corner of Jin’s mouth, the attendant cackled hideously, "They all called me the 'Blood Demon Empress'! Because every single minister I ordered executed, and all their clansmen, had their blood entirely drained by the Blood Vine Flowers I cultivated! 'Blood Demon Empress'—that is your mother!"

"No!" Jin screamed, her voice cracking. "You are not—"

Slap! The attendant struck Jin across the face with vicious force. She gripped Jin’s throat tightly and roared, "I am, I am your mother! Do you understand? You cannot deny the biological truth of our lineage! Musha’s seed and my ovum fused to create you, little one. You are my daughter, and I am your mother. Understand?"

She delivered several more hard slaps to Jin. The attendant then snarled venomously, "Do you know why I gave birth to you? Because that brute Musha took a liking to me. He claimed I possessed a special kind of Spiritual Root. He calculated and analyzed that the daughter born from us had an extremely high probability of possessing some rare, precious Spiritual Root! For this root, and for the Dultro family's Eye of the Divine Spirit, he seduced me, raped me, forced me to conceive, and then gave birth to you."

She delivered a brutal kick to Jin's lower abdomen, then sneered, "Afterward, he sent me to the Imperial Palace, and I became a consort in the Polar Star Empire. Through the combined efforts of my family and his, I became Empress, and I even bore the Emperor—that foolish man who only knows how to seclude himself for cultivation—a Prince! My son, Lie Wuxingguang, is the future Emperor of the Polar Star Empire!"

Lifting her head haughtily, the attendant glanced down at Jin’s trembling body and sneered, "Someone already knows about your existence, and someone knows about my affair with Musha. But it doesn't matter. As long as I kill you and utterly annihilate every single one of your cells, no one will be able to challenge the power and influence in my hands! My son will become Emperor, and I will become the Empress Dowager controlling everything in the Polar Star Empire. I will become a person above all others. Below one man, above ten thousand? That is not the status I pursue."

Taking a deep breath, the attendant sighed softly, "For my sake, for the sake of the one who gave you life, die, my child!"

Forcefully pulling Jin, whose body had gone limp, the attendant tenderly kissed her forehead and swiftly jabbed a finger toward Jin's brow.

"What I bestowed upon you, I reclaim entirely today! Thus, we owe each other nothing more." The attendant sighed deeply.

"Hah!" A cold laugh echoed from outside the courtyard gate. A Daoist in robes, Mu Daoren, appeared at the entrance like a phantom. Blue lightning flickered in his eyes, and with a shake of his hand, a beam of azure light, nearly a foot long, sliced toward the attendant’s body. Just as the attendant’s body was less than half an inch from Jin’s brow, the beam of light cleaved the attendant cleanly in two. A torrent of blood erupted from the attendant’s body with a gushing sound, quickly coating the courtyard in a thick layer.

The attendant’s skin fluttered down to the ground; the entire being was reduced to two extremely thin sheets of skin and a pool of blood. The possession puppet spell used by Meilin was viciously malevolent; from the moment the attendant was possessed, all the flesh, blood, and organs inside had transformed into this malodorous yet dazzlingly glossy sanguine fluid.

Jin shrieked in terror, leaping up abruptly. She scrambled onto the low fence, standing atop it, too afraid to come down.

Mu Daoren, his face grim, waved his large sleeve, whipping up a gale that swept the blood and the remnants of the body far away, depositing them hundreds of miles distant in the deep mountains. Having dealt with everything, he reached out to Jin, "Jin, I am Father. Come down."

Jin stared blankly at Mu Daoren, instinctively shaking her head.

Mu Daoren sighed and walked to the base of the fence, reaching up to pull Jin down. Jin instinctively glared, and two golden beams shot from her eyes, staggering Mu Daoren and sending him sprawling face-first onto the ground. Caught off guard, Mu Daoren was disheveled by the golden light, but he showed no anger; instead, he looked up with ecstatic joy. "This is the genuine Dharma Eye technique of the Buddhist school! Ha, where did you learn such a skill?"

Jin glared at Mu Daoren with hatred and said coldly, "From the person you killed."

The former Jin had been spirited and unpredictable. The Heavenly Eye Divine Ability taught by Gu Xichen had been impossible for her to cultivate. However, after experiencing great change, especially after witnessing Mu Daoren "kill" Gu Xichen and his group, Jin’s temperament had shifted significantly. Confined to this courtyard as if imprisoned, she had unconsciously grasped the first level of the Heavenly Eye Divine Ability.

Mu Daoren paused, then cheerfully said, "Gu Xichen and his group whom I 'accidentally killed'? Very well, on that account, I forgive what they did. Jin, go tell them—if they stop their destructive actions and cooperate with me wholeheartedly, I can grant them power unprecedented in history!"

Jin’s heart hammered wildly. She cried out, "Brother and Sister Fuya?"

Mu Daoren succinctly recounted the recent events to Jin, telling her how Gu Xichen was exacting ruthless revenge in Fantholsum, destroying over a dozen administrative planets, resulting in billions of Imperial citizens dead or injured. Furthermore, Gu Xichen had eradicated the entire foundation Mu Daoren had painstakingly built over many years, even annihilating the souls of his few true friends.

The more Jin listened, the more spirited she became, gradually gesturing excitedly. She frantically grabbed Mu Daoren’s sleeve and shouted, "Take me to them!"

Mu Daoren nodded, "I can, but first, you must learn the formula for cultivation."

After a moment of silence, Jin glanced evasively at Mu Daoren and finally nodded slowly. She didn't press for details about Meilin, and Mu Daoren, immensely relieved, offered no explanation either. The father and daughter tacitly bypassed the subject of that woman. Jin didn't want another shock, and Mu Daoren felt unable to explain.

Behind the small courtyard, they bypassed the Black Tiger Lair and followed a narrow, vine-covered path for several dozen kilometers until they reached the foot of Jade Void Peak. To show respect and remembrance, Mu Daoren and Jin refrained from using magic, walking step by step to the base of the mountain. Then, they began climbing upward along a ridge.

Even without magical flight, Mu Daoren shielded them with his protective Gang Qi, so Jin felt none of the high mountain's bitter cold or fierce winds. They arrived safely above the snow line, before a cave entrance concealed by a massive slab of rock.

Mu Daoren stood beside the colossal rock, a hundred zhang high, and exerted all his strength to shift it aside. With a deafening rumble, the rock slowly moved, revealing a cavern mouth behind it, towering over ten meters high. Chilling frost constantly jetted out from within. Along with the white cold air drifted a spiritual energy so dense it had practically condensed into mist. Bathed by the cold and spiritual energy, Jin felt her entire being illuminate, as if every pore was eagerly absorbing the essence of heaven and earth.

A contingent of twelve young Daoists, all clad in green robes, respectfully greeted them from inside the cave. One Daoist smiled and bowed to Mu Daoren.

Mu Daoren glanced at the youths and nodded, "Is it your watch today? These are critical times; be exceedingly cautious."

The Daoist quickly replied with a pleasant smile, "We understand, Elder Uncle. If it were anyone else today, we would have activated the defensive turrets on all surrounding peaks, as Great Elder brought people up the mountain."

Nodding with satisfaction, Mu Daoren took Jin’s hand and strode into the cave.

Behind the entrance lay a downward-sloping tunnel burrowing deep underground. Following the tunnel for perhaps several thousand meters, they arrived in a vast cavern-hall. This was a huge circular chamber, with nearly a hundred tunnel mouths of varying heights branching out in all directions. Countless Dultro tribesmen, wearing robes of various colors, zipped back and forth on streaks of sword light within these tunnels, busy with unknown tasks.

"Follow me. First, we pay respects to the Patriarchs of our sect." Mu Daoren straightened his appearance, brushed off a few specks of dust, and tightly held Jin’s hand as he walked toward one of the tunnels.

Jin merely looked around curiously. The stone quality in this grotto was extremely strange; the grayish-blue rock emitted a faint, pale green luminescence, making the hall as bright as day. The spiritual energy here was overwhelmingly rich, almost liquefied to waist-depth. If not for the numerous jade basins placed everywhere, in which rare spiritual herbs were frantically drawing away the surrounding energy, this chamber might have been filled entirely with liquefied spirit Qi.

The tunnel Mu Daoren was heading toward was guarded by three identical old Daoists. As Mu Daoren approached the eldest of the three, he bowed and greeted him, "Nineteenth Uncle."

The three old Daoists simultaneously opened their eyes. The central figure smiled, "Good, you're back?"

The elder on the right looked at Mu Daoren with grievance, "When did you return? I heard you’ve been causing quite a bit of trouble lately?"

The elder on the left angrily pointed at Mu Daoren and erupted in a tirade, cursing him for breaking his promise to find several top-grade Furnace Cauldrons for him; not a single one had been delivered yet.

In an instant, all three elders cried out in unison, "Bad!"

Bang, bang, bang—dozens of explosive sounds followed in rapid succession. The bodies of the two elders on the left and right simultaneously disintegrated into dust. Two beams of intense light shot out from the shattered flesh and pierced into the body of the central elder. Blood spewed from all seven orifices of the elder; his eyes rolled back, and he collapsed motionless on the ground.

Mu Daoren sighed and quickly summoned several younger tribesmen to carry the elder away for emergency treatment. He muttered helplessly, "This is my Nineteenth Uncle. He is the eighteenth younger brother of your grandfather. He wanted to cultivate the partial technique of 'One Breath Transforms into Three Pures,' but the correct formula was incomplete. After more than a hundred thousand years of research by the family, they finally devised a tricky method."

Jin looked at Mu Daoren, confused. One Breath Transforms into Three Pures—she had heard Gu Xichen mention this technique on Earth; it was profound, but he never mentioned that it would cause someone to bleed from all seven orifices! Moreover, the destruction of the two manifestations was so horrific, the blood and gore covering the ground would terrify the timid.

Sighing, Mu Daoren vaguely explained the principles of the Dultro family's version of One Breath Transforms into Three Pures. Like the Yuhsheng (Revenant) of the Dark Four Heavenly Kings among the Roman people, they used high-tech means to extract Mu Daoren’s Nineteenth Uncle’s genes, creating two clones identical to the original, indistinguishable even by aura. Then, they used a high-frequency particle cutter to forcibly slice off two portions of the Nineteenth Uncle’s soul, nurturing them with secret arts before injecting them into the two clones.

The result was that the two clones were somewhat uncontrollable, frequently disintegrating and exploding; meanwhile, the Nineteenth Uncle developed acute schizophrenia, occasionally exhibiting three distinct personalities.

Jin was stunned, her eyes glazed over, offering no comment.

Mu Daoren offered a few wry smiles and led Jin down the tunnel. As they walked, he explained, "To hide you from anyone who might wish you harm, I made one of my own clones transform into the leader of the Broken Hook Adept Group to protect you. That clone was different from Uncle Nineteen’s; it was a new body grown from my own flesh using limb regeneration technology."

After a moment of silence, Mu Daoren added, "Clones differentiated by this technology have none of the flaws of Uncle Nineteen's clones."

"But the biggest drawback is that its power can only reach the level of a Sixth Echelon Adept. However, it was sufficient just to protect you while you lived in anonymity."

Jin looked coldly at Mu Daoren and stated impassively, "And now?"

Mu Daoren pondered for a while, then nodded, "Now they know you exist, so there is no need to hide any longer. As long as you possess sufficient ability to protect yourself, it won't be an issue."

He smiled at Jin, "As long as you don't fall into their hands, no one will dare expose your identity."

Jin asked coldly, "What about that woman?"

Mu Daoren faltered, unable to speak.

Jin shot Mu Daoren a look, lowered her head, and hastened forward.

The tunnel ended in a small grotto, clearly untouched by renovation, preserving the look of raw stone and rock.

A ring of three hundred and fifty-nine corpses of Daoists, missing limbs, sat cross-legged against the four walls of the grotto. Although they had died an unknown number of years ago, their faces were still lifelike, their skin smooth and possessing a faint undercurrent of blood, as if they hadn't died but were merely sleeping.

Closest to the entrance sat a middle-aged Daoist in an apricot-yellow robe, holding a broken red sword. The left half of his sleeve area was cleaved open by a sharp instrument, leaving only the right half of his torso connected to his head. Jin stared dumbly at the massive gash on him. His skin was like jade, his muscles like crystalline dark ice, and his bones emitted a pale, smooth radiance, like the finest mutton-fat jade. The blood vessels and meridians inside the Daoist’s wound were clearly visible, but the meridians and vessels were in a hazy purplish-gold, existing in a phantom state of energy rather than solid substance.

As for the Daoist's internal organs, they distinctly displayed the five elemental colors: the heart was bright red, the lungs silvery-white, the liver greenish-blue, the kidneys pitch-black, and the spleen earthy-yellow. Each one was distinct in color, like carved gemstones. The other six viscera were also enveloped by a soft luster, glittering like precious gems and fine jade.

Despite having passed away countless eons ago, a profound aura of magical power still radiated from the Daoist’s body.

The combined magical fluctuations from the three hundred and fifty-nine Daoists converged above the grotto, forming a purple cloud mass. On top of this cloud rested three jade tablets. The central tablet bore the inscription for the Celestial Venerable Primordial of Jade Purity. Beneath this tablet, a light screen flickered, displaying numerous Daoist titles—clearly the names of the two hundred and fifty-nine Immortals of the Kunlun lineage.

The other two jade tablets were smaller than the central one, marked with the titles of the Grand Supreme Elder of the Pure Heaven and the Celestial Master of the Upper Purity.

Near the three tablets lay dozens of magic treasures glittering with varied, strange lights. Though deprived of their masters' direction, these treasures still exuded a terrifying, immense pressure.

If Han Kui or Gu Xie were present, they would immediately recognize these as Innate Treasures, all having merged with a divine soul but not yet fully integrated with the body—Innate Treasures still awaiting final union. The spoils these Immortals brought back from their expedition to another universe were indeed astonishingly rich; unfortunately, these very artifacts had led to their demise.

On the mountain wall behind these Daoists were inscribed spiritual cultivation formulae, some long, some short. In the arms of the purple-robed Daoist deepest within the grotto rested a consciousness-bearing slate, about the size of a fist.

Mu Daoren pulled Jin to bow before these deceased Daoists. He then led Jin toward the innermost purple-robed Daoist to explain. The consciousness slate held by this Daoist was inscribed with the ancient Earthworm Divine Script used by the Kunlun lineage Immortals. By merging one's divine consciousness into the slate, one could learn this language. All the cultivation formulae on the mountain wall were written in this Earthworm script.

The frustrating situation was this: an ancestor of Mu Daoren’s Dultro family had fortunately discovered this grotto and obtained the legacy of these Kunlun Immortals. However, the Immortals only left behind the Earthworm language; all other cultivation formulae required the family to decipher, analyze, and test them themselves.

Had any person of ancient Huaguo descent on Earth received this fortune, given over a hundred thousand years, they would surely have cultivated vast divine abilities. But the recipients were the Dultro family, whose cultural system and worldview were completely incompatible with the Kunlun Immortals. The cultivation methods left by these Immortals were profound and mysterious; without sufficient foundation in Daoist philosophical thought, it was impossible to truly cultivate any profound techniques.

The Dultro family spent over a hundred thousand years just trying to sort out a few usable formulae for practice. Mu Daoren's generation were the first batch of Dultro people to truly achieve success in cultivation. It was so hard, so bitter, so arduous. The ancestors of the Dultro family endured unimaginable suffering to organize these techniques. Even the most basic foundational theory—the correspondence between the Five Elements and the Five Viscera—caused the deaths of at least several hundred brave Dultro testers.

Other specialized terms such as infant, nascent soul, and incarnation were even more abstruse and difficult to grasp. Earthlings with Huaguo descent naturally possessed a basic understanding of these concepts, but the Dultro people lacked this fundamental knowledge. Over a hundred thousand years, approximately eighty percent of the Dultro family members died unnaturally—they bravely practiced the imperfect formulae that were sorted out, resulting in either schizophrenia or exploding bodies. Mu Daoren’s Nineteenth Uncle was the most prominent example: for a supreme technique like One Breath Transforms into Three Pures, he devised the perverse method of forcibly splitting his own soul into three pieces.

Jin listened, dumbfounded and unable to speak. She glanced at the deeply distressed Mu Daoren and asked timidly, "What am I supposed to cultivate?"

Mu Daoren looked at Jin gently and smiled, "It is a supreme technique that was hoped to be fully organized before you were born. Two months ago, the family finally completed it. This is the most profound and exquisite system we have compiled—a supreme divine ability for tempering the nascent soul. It is named the 'Profound Cultivation Technique of the Void'!"

Jin’s body swayed, nearly causing her to faint. Back on Earth, she had heard the name Xuan Gong, but the issue was that true Xuan Gong was meant for cultivating the flesh! How had it become a method for tempering the nascent soul at the Dultro family?

Daoist Mu grew even more animated, saying, "According to the descriptions left by our founding ancestors, the most famous ancestor who cultivated Xuan Gong was Ancestor Yang Jian! He grew a third eye on his brow—it was this third eye that earned him the supreme renown of the God of War across the Three Realms!"

Taking a deep breath, Daoist Mu chuckled, almost dancing with excitement, "And you, Jin, you possess our family's Divine Eyes. Both of your pupils carry immense power over fate, giving you a great chance to cultivate that third eye and wield the legendary, all-breaking miraculous power!"

He gripped Jin's shoulders firmly, Daoist Mu laughing wildly, "Do you know why I sought favor with Merlin? It was because of you! Because her spirit might birth a child with outstanding aptitude for Dao cultivation, and there’s a high probability that you could simultaneously possess both Divine Eyes! Jin, this cultivation method, it was prepared just for you!" Amidst his elation, Daoist Mu revealed his own eyes. Within his pair of azure pupils, only the left one faintly shimmered with a purple light. Daoist Mu possessed only one Divine Eye, and clearly, his innate talent was inferior to Jin's.

Understanding the true nature of the Xuan Gong here, Jin coldly snorted, unimpressed, "Is that so? Then... let me try it!"

Regardless of what Daoist Mu said, Jin had already made up her mind. Unless she could obtain the orthodox Xuan Gong text from Daoist Zhang, she would absolutely refuse to practice the version compiled by the Dultro family. This would lead to death! A technique meant for physical cultivation was being used to refine the nascent soul—this was suicidal!

As for Merlin, and Daoist Mu—

A chill washed over Jin’s heart. Perhaps Merlin was right; perhaps she was just a tool?

She would pretend to begin practicing the Dultro family version of Xuan Gong, and then, she would leave.

Flee Merlin, flee Daoist Mu, flee these unfamiliar clansmen.

She was Jin, merely the Junior Commander Jin of the Broken Hook Ability Group. She was not the daughter of the Empress of the Polaris Empire, nor the daughter of the Empire's Six-Star Marshal, nor a descendant of the Dultro family, one of the great houses of the Polaris Empire.

She was Jin, just someone who wanted to happily pursue what and whom she loved. She wanted to live life according to her own will, unwilling to become an obstacle or a tool for others.

Watching Daoist Mu’s ecstatic face, the ache in her heart slowly turned icy cold.

This man was not her father.

Her father was the Pirate Lord who commanded hundreds of thousands of ability users in the Broken Hook Group, not this high and mighty, power-wielding Daoist Mu.

That Pirate Lord had just been killed. Killed by her mother's hand.

The current Jin was an orphan.

She needed to find Fuya Ming. She needed to find Gu Xiachen.

She needed to find some meaning for her own existence.